Does religion corrupt morality?

[FatAndFaithless]

i meant in meaning..not grammar...

Ah, gotcha. Yes, I understand not all atheists believe morality is subjective. I did a thread on it here though, and saw that an overwhelming amount of the people here did, so figured it was ok to speak in general terms.

Again, subjective could simply mean 'not defined by an objective authority'...which most people might agree with who don't believe in 'an objective authority'.

Sorry if I missed the thread, I was busy pounding my money into my college, who is one whiny asshole when I'm paying it so much >.>

[Whateverist]

I can understand exhausted but the lonely only makes sense if your studies are taking it all out of you.

[FatAndFaithless]

Well to be fair I spent like 5 grand on travel, so getting here did take a lot out of me >.>


...I could buy like a bazillion condoms with 5 grand!

[Whateverist]

Don't yall believe morality is subjective anyway? So when ask if religion corrupts morality, wtw, who's what morality are you referring to, if morality just depends on whatever each person thinks is moral?

It's being subjective doesn't make it any less genuine from our point of view.  In fact it is those who motives are to please a divine being which are suspect from our perspective.

[robvalue]

I've caused way more harm since being an atheist. Before that, I never caused anyone or anything even the slightest inconvenience

I think the problem with religion is the way it often uncritically teaches that certain things are immoral or moral, under the guise of them offending/pleasing God. This is a totally different version of morality to the one we have naturally evolved to develop, which is based mainly on the consequences of our actions to other life forms. As such, it has the potential to brainwash people into having weird ideas about morality they may not have otherwise had.

If you're taught from day one that homosexuality is wrong, chances are you're going to think it is wrong. Had you been left alone and not been taught an opinion one way or the other, you may well have not had a reason to think it is wrong. We see it every day on this forum. When religious morality overlaps with obvious normal morality, they have no problem explaining it. But when they stop lining up, the explanations immediately become really lame.

So yeah, religion has the potential to corrupt morality. Also, when people feel they need to defend the obviously immoral things in their holy books, they have to compromise their morality to come up with explanations. They may well not believe what they are saying, but the more they defend it, the more likely it is to creep in at the edges.

[ignoramus]

Most people won't come out and say they're racist or wife bashers or gay haters because society frowns down on that behaviour.

But the same people will happily stand behind their church who preach the same.
It's the blameless society syndrome. "Sorry, can't help you, I'm a good Christian, gotta do what the bible tells me because it's the word of God".
Humanity cannot/will not progress beyond a certain point until all religions are eradicated for the toxic psychological weapons that they are.
To make matters worse, it specialises on attacking the children while they're young.
One day there'll be a universal human rights law about abusing impressionable children via indoctrination with altered states of reality/morality.

[Whateverist]

Group-think corrupts.

Hits the nail on the head.  Hard to have integrity and be a sheep.

[Anomalocaris]

I don't think religion, in and of itself "corrupts" a person's morality. I think if a person has a bad heart, they will use whatever they can as an excuse to act wrongly. Not because "religion made them do it", but because they are not good people. Bad seeds come from all walks of life. The religious ones will use religion to excuse their actions, the non religious ones will use something else. Just mho. :-)

Religion forces the immoral act of passing off wishing thinking as reality upon those who falls under its influence. Religion is immoral, and makes the religious immoral.

[Anomalocaris]

Don't yall believe morality is subjective anyway? So when ask if religion corrupts morality, wtw, who's what morality are you referring to, if morality just depends on whatever each person thinks is moral?

My subjective morality.

Which I take infinitely more seriously than that which you images some mother fucking no good lay about dead malcontent of a carpenter had taught you.

[Ben Davis]

I don't think religion, in and of itself "corrupts" a person's morality. I think if a person has a bad heart, they will use whatever they can as an excuse to act wrongly. Not because "religion made them do it", but because they are not good people. Bad seeds come from all walks of life. The religious ones will use religion to excuse their actions, the non religious ones will use something else. Just mho. :-)

The first 2 mins of this vid provide a great example of how religion can make people do bad things.